This is the absurd comedy of life: One of the Republican blowhards behind the ever so desperate, prolonged attempts to find a democratic scapegoat to burn at the stake in the wake of the Benghazi attack, Wayne Simmons—self-proclaimed “national security expert”—just pled guilty in a federal court to fraud charges. The Justice Department issued a press release April 29 stating Simmons, “falsely claimed he spent 27 years working for the Central Intelligence Agency. He pleaded guilty “to major fraud against the government, wire fraud, and a firearms offense.”

The press release went on to state:

“Simmons admitted he defrauded the government in 2008 when he obtained work as a team leader in the U.S. Army’s Human Terrain Systems program, and again in 2010 when he was deployed to Afghanistan as a senior intelligence advisor on the International Security Assistance Force’s Counterinsurgency Advisory and Assistance Team.”

And this guy has been throwing the integrity side-eye at Hillary Clinton all this time? He holds as much merit at this point as a toe-tapping congressman in an airport bathroom.

“Simmons admitted he attempted to con his way into a position where he would have been called on to give real intelligence advice in a war zone. His fraud cost the government money, could have put American lives at risk, and was an insult to the real men and women of the intelligence community who provide tireless service to this country.”

From One Nut To Another

Then there’s the icing on the political cake: Simmons (can you believe it?) was also a frequent talking head on Fox News, where it was not uncommon for him to be referred to himself as “former CIA.” As one would expect in those numerous appearances on such a network, Simmons would often throw a few punches at Democrats whenever he could find a chance, especially where his “expertise,” foreign policy, was concerned. His sensational rhetoric is even absurd enough to go so far as saying, “If the Democrats come into power in the United States and re-employ their vision of defense for this country, we will have 9-1-1s unabated.”

Though Simmons says “9-1-1s” the context seems to suggest he was actually referring to 9/11.

Simmons has been an active and vocal member of the “Citizens’ Commission” on Benghazi for Accuracy in Media (AIM)—an extension of conservative media focusing its efforts and attentions, often quite successfully, on drumming up enough pressure for House Republicans to have an excuse to launch a probing investigation on the matter in the hopes of tearing down the presumed 2016 democratic nominee for president of the United States. Under such auspices, Simmons routinely provided Fox News with his “wisdom” and “insight.” He even went so far as to claim President Obama passed on rescuing former CIA operatives and military members.

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AIM was so ashamed to discover Simmons’ fraud that the group did what it could to wipe him from their website entirely. Fox News also had to eat crow and fess up that they’d had the imposter on the air spouting anti-left bullshit for years—their so called “national security and terrorism expert.” Of course, the network also tried to save face by stating Simmons “was never employed by the channel and was never paid by Fox,” but that hardly makes up for the fact that the network self-servingly passed off a fraud as a foreign relations, security expert for more than 10 years in order to push the conservative agenda.

This is the state of American news and politics. We laugh in order to keep from crying, but that does not mean we do not despair. Here’s to the glory of “what goes around comes around.”